The string band played soft and slow, filling the dimly lit patio and alcove with continuous music, and Lyara sipped at her wine glass to keep from visibly grinning. Whisper in Brief was no longer so quiet or limited. Most tables—there were over a dozen—had at least one Lord or Lady flipping through the thin pages, discussing the contents in hushed tones and with furrowed brows.
Hilderic had released a formal written statement, denouncing the periodical as sensationalist and fabricated, but few seemed to listen—there were even requests for this second edition printing. This feast tonight appeared designed to change that sentiment.
“I’ve seen that sort of thing myself,” Lady Rigan said on the other side of Lyara’s table. The Lady was about Lyara’s mother’s age, although thanks to her petite frame and the agelessness of her dark eyes and hair she could have passed for much less. She was a young upstart, breaking into the shipping industry with the small fortune her late husband left behind after his untimely death. “I’ve spent a third of my profits this year in housing poor in the Outer Circle.”
“About time someone did something,” Lord Therburn muttered before sipping his beer. He was anything but young and upstarting. “I’ve been speaking about these issues for years and no one listened.”
Rigan offered him a demure smile. “Perhaps, my Lord, if you ever stopped talking on occasion we would be more inclined to notice when you started up again.”
The table rippled with appropriate laughter and Lyara nodded her head, pretending to take part. She’d been given a prestigious seat here with these two families thanks to Dradge’s rank, but she found herself less inclined to these sorts of political games than she really ought to be. She already knew what a proper Edras wife should be doing: gathering secrets, ingratiating favors. Instead, she stole another glance at Dradge’s empty seat beside her.
The King himself had requested a private audience with him—more than half an hour ago. Surely the old man had nothing to say for that long. Nothing good, anyway.
Adela leaned over Lyara’s shoulder to refill her mostly full wine glass. “Miss!” she gasped. “I’m sorry, did I spill on your gorgeous dress?”
The dress was gorgeous—ivory in color, silver and crystals sewn into the hem, with a tight bodice, flowing skirts, and draping sleeves—but Adela most certainly hadn’t spilled any wine on it.
“Oh my,” Lyara muttered—probably with too much enthusiasm, but she always struggled not to laugh at times like these—and quickly stood up to turn away from the rest of the table, toward the wall.
“I’ve distributed as many as I could,” Adela whispered, as she pretended to inspect Lyara’s dress. “Shoved them in coat pockets and handbags and beside the bar. I don’t think anyone saw me.”
“Thank you,” Lyara whispered, biting her bottom lip to keep from grinning outright. “You’ve been marvelous, as always.”
The girl smiled, then stepped back to curtsy. “My apologies, miss. It must have been a trick of the light, I don’t see any spill.”
“Hmm, I should hope not,” Lyara said with a haughty lift of her chin as she sank back into her seat. “Be sure to keep that hand steady in the future.”
Adela curtsied again, face scrunched up with dutiful servility, then moved to the next station at the table to continue refilling wine. Seren, seated on the other side of Dradge’s empty chair, glanced up and inspected the girl’s face as she topped off his goblet, and he kept watching her as she moved on to the next table.
Lyara watched him back on Adela’s behalf, not sure she trusted the steely intensity in his grey eyes. He hadn’t participated in the group conversation since it shifted away from Ivard of Gebrama’s On History, and had instead spent the time pouring through her Whisper as though it were a text of equal renown.
He was alone. No family, no girl to court, no friends other than Dradge. She wasn’t sure if she should pity that or think it was what he wanted.
Seren folded the periodical open to the print of the charcoal sketch Lyara had done of pious Maierva praying beside the fire for her husband’s safe return, and slid it into the empty space on the table between them. It was a humanizing portrait, one that put a face on the nebulous idea of poverty. Maierva had almost seemed honored when Lyara asked her permission to draw it; she’d gifted the girl the original copy, telling her to hang it on her wall once her husband bought that house.
“This is well done,” Seren said, meeting her gaze, that intensity unabated. “A shame the artist didn’t sign it.”
Lyara froze. “Yes.” Slowly she nodded, then snatched up her wine glass to at least keep her fidgeting hands occupied. “A shame.”
With the ghost of a smile, he nodded in Adela’s direction. “I understand that waitress has worked as a maid in your mother’s house. Is she proficient? My housekeeper is getting on in years and I may need to locate a replacement.”
Lyara scowled at him. “What’s my husband told you?”
Seren smiled outright. “Come now, give us both some credit. Dradge can’t hide the fact he’s got a secret, but he’d go to his grave before divulging it. Especially if it’s for you.”
Lyara grunted. “He is honorable. I don’t know why he tolerates your company.”
Seren just laughed. “I used to wonder that myself.” He leaned back in his chair, glancing aimlessly across the room. “I recognize I don’t make the proper investments to keep most people’s good will for long. But he’s not easily offended, and sometimes even appreciates my unsolicited advice.” He turned back, looking at her in a manner that was moderately congenial. “The way he always talked about you, I figured you were either a goddess incarnate or quite the swindler. But I see you’re neither.”
Lyara nodded, trying not to frown. “…thank you?”
Three sharp horn blasts announced the King’s return. Like a poorly trained performer’s troop, the mass of nobles attempted to rise to their feet in unison. Lyara mimicked them a few seconds behind, Seren pausing to sip from his goblet before following after her.
The massive mahogany doors opposite the patio swung open, pushed aside by two men in uniform, and Hilderic glided to the top steps, eyes squinted and nearly shut. Dradge tagged at his heels, and it didn’t take a wife’s gaze to recognize the anger on his face tonight.
The King lifted a withered, bejeweled hand. “Our people ask I defend them, and so I will.”
Lyara drew in a breath, pressing her folded hands to her chest with the audacity to hope, but she couldn’t with her husband leering like that.
“Our gallant troops will see to it,” Hilderic said, poorly hidden frustration prying his eyes open to narrowed slits. “We will defend Salkrov.”
The crowd murmured, mostly in confusion. A few clapped but that applause died before it could catch on.
“You don’t know Salkrov?” Hilderic took the single step down to stand on the same plane as the tables spread around him, meeting the gazes of the few brave enough to keep looking at him. “Dearest Salkrov? A town of twenty-two at the base of the Saligen Mountains? On the other side of the Feldland plains? Tell me, you heartless monsters, that the downtrodden there haven’t slipped your minds?”
Seren rested his face in the palm of his hand, shaking his head.
“Your majesty,” a voice piped up from somewhere in the back. “You’ll divert resources from Edras, a city of four thousand, for a town of twenty-two?”
Hilderic straightened, looking entirely too pleased with the question. “Mustn’t I? Or would that be foolishness?” He glared over his shoulder at Dradge.
Dradge set his jaw and stared back, saying nothing.
The King growled. “His squad volunteers. Two hundred on the line for twenty-two. Let that speak to the volumes of my charity.” Hilderic gathered his robes around them, then spun on his heels and stalked back through the open doors. The two soldiers hesitated when the King’s back was turned, stealing glances at Dradge, but ultimately followed, closing the door behind and leaving their General standing alone on the single-step platform.
The crowd dispersed, huddling together in groups to whisper and speculate with an almost drunken fervor. Edras thrived on this sort of drama, after all. It was half the reason her Whisper carried the weight it did.
Seren sank to his seat, crossing one leg over the other, and calmly took a sip of wine. Lyara didn’t know what to do—with herself, with her hands—so she stood there and clenched her skirt in her fists as Dradge crossed the room, ignoring questions, to reach her side.
Gently, she placed a hand on his arm, but he didn’t look up, just scowled at the floor.
“I was wrong. He won’t stick me in Edras, he’ll send me under-manned on a suicide mission.”
“Suicide mission?” She clung more tightly to his arm. “With two hundred men?”
Dradge eyed her, gaze softening a little. “Centaurs have taken Salkrov, reports say more than sixty are there right now. One of them is worth at least ten of my men, I’d need six hundred to match—hundreds more to reasonably expect victory. Hilderic wants me dead.”
A chill ran down her spine, and she pressed a hand over her mouth to hold back the tears.
“He’ll try to see to that,” Seren said. He sat back in his chair, arms folded, a treacherous smile in his eyes. “But you and I both know you’d leave with far more than two hundred if you asked.”
Dradge straightened. “I’d be court-martialed. Hanged afterwards, if I was lucky.”
Seren tilted his head and laid a hand on the Whisper in Brief on the table before him. “I suspect we could control the narrative. If we wanted.”
Lyara drew in a sharp breath and stared at her periodical. Such a simple thing, the imprint of her original sketch wasn’t even that good—the edges were smeared, it bled over the page on one side. Did she have any inkling what could become of it when she’d set out on this path? Did she really want to steal thrones, topple kingdoms? It was dangerous. Deliciously, deceptively dangerous.
She latched onto Dradge’s wrist first, then Seren’s, and dragged both men toward the side stairs exit. “This is not the place for that sort of talk.”